THE TYPES OF BACILLI OF THE DYSENTERY GROUP. ! 
By Y. K. OHNo. - 
(From the Institute for Infectious Diseases, Tokyo, Japan.) 
INTRODUCTION. 
The etiological importance of Bacillus dysenteriw (Shiga) as the causa- 
tive factor in dysentery was first proved in Manila by Flexner (1), 
Strong (2, 3), and Musgrave (3), and Strong strictly distinguished 
between two types of dysentery, viz, the bacillary and the ameebic. The 
latter type, as a rule, pursues a chronic course and amcebe can generally 
be discovered at all times in the stools, whereas the former is an acute 
disease, the causative factor of which is Bacillus dysenteria. Bacilli of 
apparently identical characteristics were later isolated from dysenteric 
stools in Europe, Asia, and America, so that to-day the etiologic impor- 
tance of Bacillus dysenteriv in sporadic, endemic, and epidemic dysentery 
has become fully recognized. 
Subsequently, in the year 1900, when the papers of Flexner, Strong, 
and Musgrave had already been published, Kruse (4) reported on an 
epidemic of dysentery occurring in Laar, Germany. 
At that time Kruse thought he had encountered an organism which differed 
from the Shiga bacillus. This led to a further discussion of the subject of 
differentiation by Shiga and by Flexner, who claimed motility for Bacillus dysen- 
teriw, and by Kruse who had never observed this phenomenon in any of his 
cultures. In June, 1901, Kruse (5) contributed a second paper in which he 
concluded that Flexner’s bacillus was probably closely related to, but still a 
variety of the species he (Kruse) had isolated, and, although he had not examined 
Shiga’s cultures, he believed from the similarity in the description between 
Shiga’s and Flexner’s organisms and from the geographical situation of Japan 
and the Philippines that the two cultures were identical, and consequently that 
his own and Shiga’s bacillus were very similar organisms. In this same paper 
he also reported on epidemic dysentery in insane asylums and from some cases 
of this nature he isolated organisms which could not be distinguished morpholog- 
ically or culturally from the genuine dysentery bacillus, but which differed from 
it in their serum reactions. By a careful comparison of their action with the 
*Read before the Section of Bacteriology, Hygiene, and Infectious Diseases of 
the Japanese Medical Congress, March 4, 1906. 
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Ss Oe ae 
